There Is No Way to "Balance" Free Speech and "Hate" Speech
Whenever and wherever you set up such a balancing act, the scales are tipped in the censors' favour. In Egypt, for example, a man has been sentenced to three years in prison because he "insulted" Islam on his facebook page. In handing down sentence, the Egyptian court sounded remarkably like one of Canada's many kangaroo "human rights" courts:
The court said freedom of belief doesn’t excuse contempt that may offend believers and “subject the regime and the country’s security to serious dangers.”
Well, isn't that always the excuse the censorious use to silence the spirited, uppity and rude--that they are trying to ward off the "dangers" that could ensure from free expression? In other words, they're only doing it for our own good (while, really, it's about the desire of a few to exert control over the many).
What's really frightening is not that the few should wish to control the many--exerting power, like satisfying hunger, is what behavioral psychologists term an _intrinsic_ stimulus for all but the saintliest among us--but that so many of the many hunger for such control. I still am amazed, though I shouldn't be, that so many of my acquaintances will vehemently defend the well-nigh useless but exceedingly demeaning security Kabuki theater at U. S. airports on the basis that it makes them "feel" safe, efficacy--not to mention personal dignity and liberty--be damned.
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